Why we farm…farming as a creative endeavour.

So…. what’s your mission here on earth? You are here with a unique set of skills, which puts in an ideal position to make a unique contribution to the world. Sure, there are others that could (and will) make similar contributions, but your context is unique. No one else has ever lived in your shoes nor will they ever.

There are so many ways to manifest this gift to the world… and at so many scales. Some of us contribute through mindful parenting right here in our little house hold while others make contributions on a global scale which are of no less value.

The sole criteria of success is the willingness to step up to the plate. Did I give it my all? Was I willing to step out of the comfort of my own inner dialogue? Did I engage the world with integrity?

For many, organic farming is a means of making this contribution. When I started Ferme Mélilot in the winter of 2009-2010, I was ready to make a tangible positive impact. I had spent years pondering how to change the world. My ear was well familiarized with all manner of philosophical and political environmental discourse, and frankly I was sick of it! Enough blah blah… time for action! Even if it was just on 1 or 5 or 10 acres, at least I could see that I was creating positive change through my work.

The farm truly serves a wealth of purposes: a source of income, an excellent environment to raise a family, an tool to enact environmental reform, a platform for rural economic development, and an artistic and creative endeavour (Excel and a bare field were my favorite canvases upon which played out my artistic creation through the intricacies of diversified vegetable crop planning … part dance, part mosaic, part theatre, part painting.)

So.. what is is for you? What drives you?

What purposes does your farm serve for you?

 

Our three roles on the farm: Captain, Manager, Worker.

Imagine we are in a rainforest… our task is to cut a trail through the forest.

The workers are the ones swinging the machetes. Chopping through the forest.

The managers are right behind them: finding the best machete, the best way to swing it, rotating the workers so everyone gets a rest, measuring progress… etc.

The Captain is the one who climbs up a tree… looks around… and shouts ‘Wait, Wait… We’re in the wrong forest!!!’  

(to which the managers usually respond ‘shut up, we’re making great progress’)

You can hire people as workers and managers… but the role of captain is your unique ability.. No one can replace you as captain of your farm (or co-captain depending on how your business is structured).

And yet so many of us spend all our time in the roles of manager and worker.

It is so important to dedicate some time every week to the role of captain.

To take a few minute of calm to look out over the horizon and see what’s coming next.

Is the farm headed in the direction you envisioned? How will the farm adapt to evolving conditions around it? What is your vision, your goals for the farm?

What do you enjoy about the farm, what are you grateful for, what makes you happy?

What doesn’t work for you, what is causing you the most stress, how will this be rectified?

It doesn’t have to be long. Simply the act of taking this time each week creates the mental space for vision to emerge throughout the rest of the week as well.

Go make a ruckus!

 

PS: The rainforest metaphor is taken from ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People‘ by Stephen Covey….. a book which has been very influential for me. I highly recommend it!

Delegating a task vs Delegating a role.

We can’t do it all….despite what we may sometimes think 😉

There are simply too many tasks on a farm to be able to do all of them.

Not only this… but by delegating certain types of tasks, we free ourselves up to focus on using our super power (for me it’s using my lazer beam third eye).

As business owners there are certain roles and tasks on the farm that are best suited to us. There are certain tasks that when we focus on them, we get the largest return in terms of our time and energy. These tend to be big picture, vision, and management level activities.

So how do we best delegate? This starts by being very clear with ourselves about what we are delegating… the distinction to make is between the delegating a task and delegating a role.

Delegating a task:

This is the basic level of delegation. We assign a specific task or set of tasks to someone or to a team. The clearer we are in our instructions, the better.

Specifically we need to be clear about:

  • What done looks like… what is the desired outcome;
  • How long the task is to take;
  • What tools and materials are needed;
  • Details of the techniques involved.

Verbal communication can be tricky, it is almost impossible to be sure that people have heard what you actually said. Taking the time for people to repeat back to you the key elements of the task is a good idea,

Yes…. delegation takes time. Time to clearly communicate, time to issue written directions, time to train them, and time to follow up. Which is why it is great if you can find a way to not only delegate a task, but an entire role.

Delegating a role:

Herein lies the real power of delegation.

When you delegate a role, you free up your mind to focus on those areas of your business that only you can do…. to focus on your role as captain of the ship rather than on operational management.

While details are important when getting someone started in their newly delegated role, the key is to be clear about the desired outcome and purpose of the role. What is that role to achieve, what outcome to you seek, what is the available time frame, what criteria will be used to determine success, and most importantly WHY is this role crucial to the success of the farm (putting the role in context vis a vis the big picture.

Perhaps you might notice how well this maps onto the OPA framework .

Let us consider the delegation of the role of greenhouse manager for a farm growing their own seedlings for field vegetable production:

    • Outcome: To produce healthy thriving seedlings that will be ready for transplanting on schedule (as determined by the field planting schedule). Criteria for success are leaf color, the presence of a rooting system allowing the seedling to be easily pulled from the tray while also not being root bound, healthy, white roots, absence of insect pests or diseases, readable tags in each tray detailing crop type, variety, and seeding date, seedling has been hardened off at least 3 days prior to planting, weekly update on what will be ready to plant this week, seedlings are ready on time for planting as planting in the transplanting calendar

 

  • Purpose (how does this role fit into the big picture): Healthy seedlings are the foundation for a productive transplanted crop, seedling vigour and health directly determines how well the seedling will adapt to field conditions and how fast it will grow, vigorous seedlings give us a head start on weeds and insect and contribute to growing healthy, profitable crops… healthy profitable crops allow this farm to thrive, to pay the employees and provide high quality nourishing food to the community we serve.
  • Action: Here is where you guide the person to get started in this role. What are the current best practices/standard operating procedures, intro to the greenhouse seeding calendar, how to document improvements in the system, tools and materials needed.

 

The idea here is that you are getting them off to a good start… you check back in to support them to fully appropriate the role… and then you let them do it!

Resist the urge to ‘micro manage’!

You must trust them and, yes, you must accept that there is a learning curve. Schedule regular meetings with your management staff to support them in achieving success. Everyone wants to succeed, your role is to set them up for a win and them let them run with the ball.

So…

What is your superpower? What is your unique ability in your farm business? Where does your time and energy produce the greatest return? How can you better focus your attention on the big picture… on being the captain of the ship?

What tasks can you delegate?

What roles can you delegate?

Let me give you a hint, it’s more than most farmers usually admit 😉

I suggest you make a list with three columns:

  1. My super powers/unique abilities
  2. Easily delegatable
  3. Harder to delegate.

Now… what role are you willing to delegate this week? Is there anywhere on the farm that you need to be more clear regarding something you have delegated?

Have fun! (seriously, the fun factor is so important!)

 

Putting the champagne moment at the top of your to-do list!

Ahhh… the to do list! We’ve all got one and sometimes it seems like most of the time it gets longer rather than shorter!

To do lists are such an important tool for managing our farms and there are some nuances that I would love to dive into over the next couple of weeks.

First off… how to get the list to get shorter and shorter over time…

There are actually 4 ways to get a task off of your to do list

  • accomplishment (do it);
  • deferral (decide to delay the due date);
  • delegation (someone else does it);
  • deletion (decide that it will not get done… and remove it entirely from your list).

It is important to note that actually doing the task is only one of 4 options at our disposal for shortening our to do list.

Once you have drawn up the list of things to do for the day ask your self: Which of these tasks is the champagne moment… which task would getting done cause you to bust out the champagne (real or metaphorical) and celebrate? Great now put that one at the top of your list… this is your Most Important Action (MIA). Next choose 2 other top priorities. Focus on these top 3 tasks early in the day…. the rest of the list is gravy.

And… don’t forget to take a moment and actually celebrate when you get these done… savouring the accomplishment, regardless of how much is still on your list.

What is one thing that would cause you to celebrate if you got it done today? … this week? …. this month?

Go make a ruckus!

How the farm pays

Alright folks… lets get clear about something.

There are only two activities that generate value on the farm.. planting vegetables, and harvesting. These are the only two activities that your clients are actually paying you to do.

All the rest… I mean ALL the rest… is simply setting the stage for planting, or setting the stage for harvesting.

 

Setting the Stage for

PLANTING

Setting the Stage for

HARVEST

Planning Tillage

Drainage

Fertilization

Green Manures

Stale seed-bed prep

Occultation

Post Harvest tillage

Record keeping

Weeding

Irrigation

Pest control

Trellising

Pruning

Mulching

Marketing

Record keeping

The things is, many of us are farming nerds… we love the intricacies of each of these stage setting activities. In the process we sometimes lose sight of the fact that all these activities are just here to support planting and harvesting.

What is one way you could streamline the stage-setting process?

Are all activities on the farm centered around supporting the planting and harvesting processes?

What would it look like on your farm in planting and harvesting were the primary activities?

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PS: The title to this blog post is actually a (not so) secret shout out to one of my favorite farming books ‘How the farm pays’ from 1884.

How to unblock yourself when feeling stuck or overwhelmed.

Do you ever feel frozen or overwhealmed by all there is to do? I do! The result is that I resort to turning in circles, procrastinate, and engage in compulsive behaviours (yeahy compulsive BBC news consumption!)

What’s more, in those moments, my monkey mind perks up and loves nothing more than to rehash those negative self-dialogues about how I am not up to the task.

But seriously… What is more interesting: my shortcomings or my dreams and goals?

It seems like an obvious answer… so why do i spend so much time focusing on my shortcomings.

Perhaps it is because I would love to be even better… that I am perfectionist? That’s bullshit… as if I had to choose between peace of mind and self improvement or achievement. The truth is that this is one more beautiful paradox to embrace. The paradox of accepting that all is well, exactly as it is… while simultaneously journeying towards some future vision of ourselves and of what we would love to achieve.

The key here is to see that these moments are normal… all that is going on here is that we temporality entertain a conversation with our monkey mind. Monkey mind is a Buddhist term referring to that chattering internal voice that goes from worry to fear and back to worry etc. It is actually a very useful part of our ‘caveman brain’ that is here to keep us alive. The problem is that our brain has not yet adapted to modern life. It’s like we’re running modern software on a 100 000 year old computer.

So in those moments, there is no point in arguing or reasoning with monkey mind… it always wins (and sometimes resorts to the good old monkey tactic of feces flinging).

Rather, the way forward is to simply tell monkey mind ‘thank you for sharing’ (give it a hug)…. and gently shift our attention to something more interesting… to thoughts actually worth thinking. Without judgment or worry, we simply shift our attention (similarly to how during meditation we simply bring our attention back to our breath whenever our mind wanders).

So….

 

What would you love to focus on this week?

 

What would you love to focus on as you move towards your dreams and goals?!

 

I suggest you write this down Monday morning on your plan for the week and refer back to it whenever you smell the bananas (key sign that monkey mind is present).

The sabbath (day of rest): one of the most important tools in the farmer’s toolbox!

It’s easy to work 7 days a week… we love farming and there is sooo much to do. In fact, the work can seem to be endless.

But…

What if the way to get more done was actually to take a day of rest (or two)?

There have been times in the early years of my farm where I worked 7 days per week and 80+ hours per week. What I noticed was that the 30 extra hours between 50 and 80 hours per week are way less productive. Not only that, but the fact that I was working so much dulled my mind and body and decreased my productivity during those first 50 hours of work per week.

I have also noticed that the top farms in our networks are usually the ones taking 1 or 2 days off per week. Is it that they are able to take time off because they are awesome farmers… or are they on top of their shit because they take time to recharge their batteries each week?

While working 7 days per week and 80+ hours may appear to be the only way to get it ‘all done’, this may actually not be the best way to optimize your performance.

And this is not just my experience. The scientific literature abounds with studies showing that working more is not the best strategy. (for example, this study suggesting a sharp drop in productivity past 50-60 hours per week.

OK… enough boring stuff 🙂

 

Would it be OK with you if life got easier?

 

Would it be OK with you if you were allowed to take a day off to rest, to recharge, to cultivate another of your interest? (or even a weekend)

Which day of the week will be your day of rest this summer?

What systems or support do you need to make this happen? What is the bare minimum that needs to happen on that day (watering the seedling, irrigation…. )

Try it out, make the decision, share it with your team and loved ones, and stick to it!

 

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PS: Harvest the zucchinis extra small and skip a day or 2.

PPS: Did you know that at certain periods of history, working 7 days per week was punishable by death (aka Moses in the Old Testament)… whoa.. I am not suggesting we go that far, but it does make you think.

 

Planning for Profits… Monitoring for Results. (Aka how much money do you want to make?)

Profits are often thought of as being what is left over once the expenses have been deducted from the sales.

But, what if there were another way?

What if you could decide how much you wanted to get paid this year?

Well… you can.

In fact, the act of deciding how much profit you would LOVE to make this year is the critical first step in running a profitable farm business.

The more our intentions are clear and well defined with ourselves and the ‘universe’, the more we are able to manifest our goals and vision with ease.

What we’re doing here is rearranging the way we think of the profit formula:

From Income-Expenses= Profits… to Income-Profits=Expenses.

So, what’s it for you? How much money would you love to make this year?

Now, I’m not talking about some pie in the sky/ pipe dream number.

Pick a number that is attainable AND is somewhat of a stretch….something slightly outside your comfort zone… A number that, if you reached it, would cause to to celebrate and bust out the champagne (actual or metaphorical). I suggest somewhere between 10-25K $ per full time farmer (or even up to the 50K $ range if you are further along on the profitability journey.)

Great ! Now look at what gross income you can realistically expect to sell this year… somewhere between 10-25% more than last year.

Now, let’s take a look back at our rearranged version of the profit formula:

Income-Profits=Expenses

We anticipate what we can sell. We decide how much profit we want. We then have a clear picture of what our spending budget is for the year and we go about deciding how that budget will be spent.

Make no mistake… our expenses are way more flexible than we generally realise. Being passionate about farming, it is all too easy to spend way more than needed. Especially given that all too often we have no idea how much we have spent so far this year versus what we were planning on,

So plan it out! Both by expense type and by month. (Breath) I find it to be very useful to add a safety margin to this cash-flow projection equivalent to 5-10% of planned expenses.

Super! So you have a plan… now what?

Monitoring cumulative income and expenses EVERY MONTH is the key to results!

We can’t manage what we don’t measure.

Yes.. This means keeping your books up to date.

But the more important step is to compare where you are at currently with where you had planned to be…. and take actions to correct any deviations. This often means being creative or frugal with what we purchase when we see that a certain expense category is getting ahead of itself. Yes, it’s cheaper per screw to buy the box of 1000 screws… but if your hardware budget is running low, you’re better off with the box of 100 screws if that’ll get you through the year.

Alternately, this can mean exploring new marketing avenues or putting more energy into existing ones… though the control of expenses is what is more often overlooked in my experience.

So there you have it. This process does take some effort up from to get it all set up and running, but I promise you the results will surprise you. Personally, this method not only boosted my net income up past 70K$ per year (as sole manger of the farm, working 40-55 hours per week, with 5-6 employee) but it also greatly reduced my anxiety around money and took the guesswork out of operating the business.

Go make a ruckus!

Setting the stage for growing great crops

The second system I would like to dive into as part of the 3S triangle is pre-plant system.

By this I mean all the elements that go into creating a hospitable environment to receive the transplants or the seeds that will grow to be your crop. The pre-planting system sets the stage for the effective cultivation of vegetable crops.

The components of the Pre-planting Prep System are:

  • Farm layout and design
  • Drainage
  • Irrigation
  • Crop rotation
  • Fertilisation
  • Tillage

Here are some useful questions to consider when taking a closer look a the pre-plant system.

Farm layout and design

  • How are the various physical elements of the farm located with relation to one another?
  • Spaghetti diagram of the flow of people and materials (ie the flow of energy around the farm)
  • Are fields areas split into equal sized blocks?
  • Are field borders and pathways mowed regularly?

 

Drainage:

  • Does the water table sit low enough under field areas so as to allow proper aeration of the root zone?
  • Does surface water flow away from cropping areas in a controlled manner?
  • Does rain fall percolate rapidly into the soil?
  • Can the fields be worked within 2-4 days of an average rainfall event?
  • Does surface water flow away from farm roads and infrastructure in a controlled manner?

 

Irrigation:

  • Does the farm possess sufficient water reserves to provide 1-2 inches of water to vegetable crop areas per week for a 6-8 week period?
  • Is surface water channeled and captured in retention ponds?
  • Can the entire crop area be irrigated within 4 days with ease?
  • Can irrigation be automated to provide multiple short interval irrigations to key crops?
  • Are crop appropriate irrigation méthodes used? (Drip tape, sprinklers, timing, amount?
  • Is rainfall and soil moisture monitored on a regular basis?
  • How are irrigation decisions made?

 

Crop Rotation:

  • Is there a systematic crop rotation?
  • What area of each crop family is cultivated?
  • At what frequency do the crop families return to a given block?
  • Are green manures integrated in a systematic manner?
  • Does the rotation decrease the presence of weeds?
  • Are targeted bare fallow or occultation periods used to reduce weed pressure?
  • Does the rotation build or deplete soil health and fertility?
  • Does the rotation include any deep rooted fibrous root systems?
  • Do you have enough crop land to implement the necessary rotation system?
  • Is the soil protected from erosion for the winter?

 

Tillage and fertilisation:

  • What is the bed prep sequence from start to finish?
  • Are soil profiles used to make decisions regarding the need for deep tillage?
  • Do tillage practices reduce or increase weed pressure?
  • Are stale seedbed techniques used?
  • Is deep tillage followed by deep rooted green manures to stabilize the work?
  • Is the source of fertility (compost, manure) introducing weed seeds?
  • Is the fertilisation regime increasing or decreasing nutrient levels?
  • Is the fertilisation regime balancing or unbalancing nutrient levels? (Especially K vs. Mg)

 

Quite a bit of food for thought… Bon Appétit !

 

Sticking to your goals vs. go with the flow… or both?

And we’re off!!

After spending the winter enjoying the abundant snow here in Magog, we’re hitting the road… shifting into nomadic mode… #vanlife 😉 First stop: Earthaven Ecovillage in North Carolina (www.earthaven.org)

Well, in fact, we were supposed to leave last wednesday, April 18th. We had set that date as part of the goal setting process (S.M.A.R.T. goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time Based).

The thing is, last week rolled around and we just weren’t ready. It was Tuesday night, and there was still a long list of minor improvements we wanted to make to the van, our stuff wasn’t packed, and the house was a mess.

Goals are meant to bring us joy. The process of reaching for a goal is a playful one. Indeed, to take an example from sports, a goal is ‘the object towards which play is directed’… as in GOOOOOOOAL! By comparison, tasks bring you relief (as in completing your tax return is a task, not a goal). Thank you ACE for this great distinction (www.acecoachtraining.com).

So instead of forcing ourselves to achieve the goal we had set of leaving by april 18th, we realised that it would bring us much more joy to push back our departure date by a week… we have that flexibility, so we might as well enjoy it! Plus, it turns out the weather in North Carolina last week was really not great for camping anyways… and this week is going to be beautiful!

The key is to live intentionally, to make conscious choices in our life with full awareness. To be flexible with ourselves and to have the degree of self awareness and support necessary to discern between abandoning a goal out of fear vs. joyfully updating a goal to reflect the current YOU.

What goals do you have?

Are they S.M.A.R.T.?

Are the goals you have set for yourself in the past still pertinent today?

Do they bring you joy?